2024-03-21

Australian Grand Prix Prediction: Prancing Horse target podium position

Red Bull Racing romped to another one-two finish in Saudi Arabia and they will be hoping to continue their utter dominance of the grid when the Formula One entourage heads to Melbourne for the Australian Grand Prix this weekend.

Max Verstappen won last year’s iteration but Sergio Perez could only manage a fifth-place finish, with Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso taking podium positions in Melbourne.

That is an unlikely top three this time around, though, with Ferrari looking a clear second-best after the opening two races of this season and hoping for a third-successive podium finish, although it would take a brave bettor to back against Max Verstappen triumphing yet again this weekend.

Australian Grand Prix Betting Tips

Charles Leclerc to finish on the podium @ 3/4

After winning 17 of the 19 Grands Prix since last year’s trip to Australia, Max Verstappen looks unopposable at 1/6 but we can look towards Charles Leclerc to maintain Ferrari’s strong start to the season by clinching another top-three spot ahead of their lagging competitors.

Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz was absent due to appendicitis in Saudi Arabia and it is unclear whether the Spaniard will be fit to return to the cockpit this week, leaving the impressive Oliver Bearman as a potential stand-in again, but neither driver should trouble Leclerc in the standings.

As impressive as the 18-year-old Bearman was on his Formula One debut, he is an inexperienced talent and it would be a huge shock to see him even challenge the established generational talent of Charles Leclerc.

Sainz, should he make the race, is capable of going toe-to-toe with his teammate but he will have had little time to prepare during his recovery from appendix surgery, leaving Leclerc with the upper hand against whichever teammate he pairs with in Melbourne.

As for the rest of Leclerc’s podium challengers, Verstappen and Sergio Perez look almost certain to be up there after Red Bull secured successive one-two finishes in the first two races of the season, but the rest of the field are lagging behind in terms of pace.

The Prancing Horse have taken the final spot on the podium in both Bahrain and Jeddah, with Sainz taking third and Leclerc taking fourth in the curtain raiser before Leclerc finished third in Saudi Arabia. The Maranello-based team appear to have the second-best car on the grid and Leclerc undoubtedly has the talent to convert that into a strong finish.

Leclerc retired from third position in last season’s Australian Grand Prix but won the race in 2022, and he can claim a fourth podium in the last five Grands Prix this Sunday.

George Russell to beat Lewis Hamilton @ 4/6

Lewis Hamilton seems to be struggling to get his head around the Mercedes offering this year and that could open the door for George Russell to continue his promising start to the campaign in Australia.

Russell, who is fighting to become the Silver Arrows’ number-one driver next season, has finished fifth and sixth in the opening two races this season, with his Ferrari-bound teammate managing disappointing seventh and ninth-place finishes respectively.

Additionally, Melbourne’s Albert Park Circuit has not been Lewis Hamilton’s strongest track over the course of his career. The seven-time world champion has only won two of the 16 Australian Grands Prix he has taken part in and only one of those triumphs came in the turbo-hybrid era at Mercedes-Benz.

Russell took a podium spot and finished one position ahead of Hamilton here in his debut season at Mercedes and he qualified an impressive second last year - with Hamilton in third - before being forced to retire in the race itself with an engine problem.

He can keep his strong start going by beating his outbound teammate on Sunday.